


Failing Means You're Playing

by TheLittleDayDreamer



Category: Peaky Blinders (TV)
Genre: 1920s, BBC, F/M, Gangs, Glasgow, Marriage of Convenience, Scottish, Teen Pregnancy, Unplanned Pregnancy
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2019-08-14
Updated: 2019-11-05
Packaged: 2020-08-31 23:29:32
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 2
Words: 2,043
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/20248429
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/TheLittleDayDreamer/pseuds/TheLittleDayDreamer
Summary: "For a midwife, you joined the pudding club awfully quickly." Esme nudged the redhead with the loose stack of files, filled with both her's and John's work for the rest of the morning. Though conveniently, he had yet to show up in the betting shop; nursing a hangover from last night's festivities in The Garrison."Hmm, maybe I just wanted to make up for lost time wae ma old pal fae years ago?" Nora teased back, watching her friend sit at the opposite side of the table, "-or tie masel doon tae the riches of the Shelby family? The lonely wee Glesga lassie, finally wae a roof that willnae fall in."Esme laughed at Nora's gallus and dramatic gestures. "You're so full of shit, y'know that?""Aye, an you smell like it."





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Welcome! This is Michael and Nora's definitive story because all the one-shots are to varying degrees of accuracy in the canon I was creating. This will follow the show - including season five, in fact, especially season five - though, "Kingdom Come." does centre around a specific episode, it will be re-written.

**February 18, 1923. **

"Jesus suffering _fuck!"_

Nora cried, squeezing the young nurse's hand once more, causing the silver band around her finger to begin digging into some skin, pushing against her bone. The nineteen-year-old had been placed in a rather familiar ward, a ward that typically she would be frantically running round, looking for everything and anything to soothe the birthing mother who she considered to be slightly hyperbolic in their screaming rage fits and the number of co-workers who left a shift with a larger bruise or broken hand. Now, it was _her_ turn and lord, she was slowly regretting those callous assumptions. _Was the room always this bleak? Were the lights always this blinding? Was the nurse always this, unhelpful?_

The sweat from her palms was sliding against Ethel's, the hand would fall eventually but focusing her pain into something else right now made the knife-like sensation in her lower-body slightly bearable, since the supposed soft mattress felt more like lying on a bed of stone, scrapping her spine.

Her thighs felt completely numb, simply dead weight, as did her arms since she'd tried propping herself onto them. Accompanying the physical pain was the nauseating feeling in her head, like a buzz from a cigarette, but worse; like after each drag someone was slamming a brick to your skull every few minutes. The teen hadn't eaten all day either, she knew what was in that hospital food and it'd just make her sick, actually sick. 

But, it was for the baby, right? Her little one, her little nuisance, the wee bairn and at one point, her little problem. Nora didn't want to be a mother, well, she wasn't keen on it. Motherhood was such a foreign concept to her and not because she didn't have any children to know; she'd just never experienced having one, having a mother. _Could she be destined to fall in her parent's footsteps? _

"How's it feel to be in the_ big-girl's_ _bed_ Nora?"

She turned to glare at her teasing co-worker

"Oh, it's lovely. Want a go?"

Nora knew there was no ill-intent in Ethel's words and that she was only trying to lighten the mood and keep her distracted but just like all the other times she'd humorously comment; it couldn't have been any less agitating.

"Just a few more pushes love, doing much better than I did with my first." Polly eased, petting her daughter-in-law's damp forehead then removing some stands of hair from her face. 

The redhead tries to respond but what releases is a straggled groan as the same sharp pain hits once again.

"Where's Esme?" _Push! breath,_ "-she said she'd be here!"

"Esme's making sure the lads aren't getting too bloody shit-faced down The Garrison."

Nora didn't know whether to be relieved or infuriated. As much as she loved Polly, and the fact she was having _her_ grandchild, she wanted Esme. It was only fair, they'd be even. Nora couldn't have her husband, so she wanted her best-friend, her _sister._

"Ah, ah feel lit ma fanny's oan fire." 

Slipping into her mother-tongue was strangely cathartic.

_Ugh, fuck._

She was never sleeping with Michael again, ever. Not in the bed, car, dining table, The Garrison and certainly not, Michael's _fucking_ desk. _That one was too close, Isaiah wouldn't have let them hear the end of that._ It didn't matter how close he got, how much he touched her or how high they got. She trusted Michael about as far as she could throw him. And yet, there's nobody she didn't want more right now. This was his baby but, whilst he downed multiple pints with his cousins, Nora was on the verge of ripping out Ethel's eyes just because her golden crucifix chain hanged far too close to her face reflecting the sun behind.

"We have a head!"

In that moment, the world seemed to move at a rapid pace, a collection of pushes, _screeches,_ words of motivation from Polly and her mate on either side, gripping at her and finally the striking cry of a baby, her baby.

She breathed a sigh of relief letting her body finally relax.

A little boy with beautiful blue eyes and blond hair; he was perfect.

Nora couldn't believe it, he was really_ her's._

_George Colin Gray. _


	2. Black Tuesday

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Nora's fresh start.

Nora gripped her coat’s inner rim, clinging at the worn cotton as the brash gust of wind hit against the small huddled group of mothers, grannies and aunts behind the grim fencing, all waiting to collect which ever child they crawled out the warmth of their duvets for. It was the usual: stand outside the school, freezing, whilst the neighbourhood’s women stare in disgust at the twenty-six-year-old who’d had her own trouble with the law.

She couldn’t say she was surprised – mob-mentality was a grand concept – but it didn’t mean they were right. Nobody in Bridgeton was a saint. Still, she was about as far from the _Virgin Mary_ as humanly possible, so, there’s that. Though, what was strikingly odd was just who the perpetrators of said scowls were; as the elder women look on in sympathy, it was the young girls, likely younger than herself glowering both here and just passing down the clatty lanes.

As if they’d fucking know. They didn’t know _shit_.

She’d never considered being the maternal type, even after her own two children, Nora wasn’t made to be a mother – ran in the family apparently – and yet, there was nothing she loved more. Even if it took numerous, stern blethers from her sharp-witted mother-in-law about how gifted she had been to be blessed with two little horrors. But, they were _her_ little horrors.

Because _she_ knew, being a mother and an aunt were two very different things. Polly only wanted the best for her Michael’s kids.

“I know it’s a fucking sin hen,” said an optimistic voice, “but it’ll get better.”

Nora sighed, swallowing before she glanced that the woman to her left. An elderly woman, picking up her grandchildren, rather than immediate family. She wore a stitched hat, filled with a variety of bright colours as her snow-white hair peered out of the ends. Having a rather hunched frame, it meant the younger girl towered over her, like one of the kids.

“Agnes, ye tell me this every mornin’,” she weakly smiles, “it hisnae got better.”

“Got better fur wee Isa.”

Scoffing, Nora interjected, “Ma cousins were in their mid-twenties Agnes, fighting a war.”

“They’re still _her_ weans, in’t they?”

She bit her lip, then shoved her hands back into the coat’s pockets hoping to clobber up some heat ignoring the embarrassment from her brash contradiction.

“Aye, jist cause they areny _bairns_.”

“Sorry, it’s just-”

“It’s aw’right hen.” She comfortingly patted her bicep, reaching up. “Ah know whit ye mean.”

They spoke some more: a bit about the terrible weather, the lads in the pub and whichever boy in the tenements it was this week who’d been slashed in a fight down the road. Although it was quickly abrupted by the ringing of the school bell, like a brutal nostalgia trip. It felt like just yesterday Nora was standing here, her bag filled with all the stolen pencils they could nick off drunken punters when they’d write down bets before the football, their dad’s calendar book for a makeshift notebook – Alec said they were good for playtime, but _not when it’s pishing_ down – and a lucky cufflink Edie had dug up in the Taylor’s Inn lavvy-hut out back.

The redhead watched carefully as the double-doors rapidly swung open, revealing a barrage of wee-yins, running for the gates; half of them for the bus, knowing their mother’s would surely hook their ears if they dared be late for tea she’d spent all day making.

“Ach, I swear if this lassie’s covered in ink again, ‘er mammy’s gonnae leather ‘er.”

* * *

“Where’s ma daddy?” Robert asks, sipping his lukewarm orange juice sitting atop the bar, which wasn’t out of the ordinary particularly during quiet times. She and her siblings did the same thing, homework sprawled across the sticky surface. Their teachers were never too happy with the rimmed stains. “Mammy said to gee him money.”

The pub was rather vacant, each customer was sitting further from the next, nursing pints either enjoying a fag or reading the paper before they’d head to the game later-on this afternoon. Nobody would need serving anytime soon, which was good for the eight-year-old.

She hummed in response, storing away some clean glasses in the cabinets below trying to avoid any accidental damages that her own dad would surely ring her neck for. “Should be back in two wee minutes,” Nora pinches his cheeks, “is that for the messages?”

He nods pulling out a handful of pennies, some slipping on to the floor. “Whit’d ah tell you wee-yin, bloody dropping everything at yer backside.” She teases, bending back down to collect the fallen change before tucking it back into small hand. “I think yer daddy’s gone tae get them the noo, so you keep that fur when ye go up Sauchiehall Street on Saturday wae granda.”

Watching Robert’s face glow with glee, her heart soars. It wasn’t a regular occurrence he’d get to go into town, with both parents working long hours so it’d be nice for him to get something if he really liked it, rather than whinging for it.

“Did ye have a good day?”

“Mhmm, Joseph gave me a pen he got in Blackpool!” Robert, sticks the item in his aunt’s face as she begins wiping the taps, “said he found it in the sand on the rocky-beach.”

Nora warmly smiles, seeing the sheer excitement and curiosity in his face. It’s almost bittersweet.

George was his father’s double at heart, as whilst there were strong similarities just looking in her nephew’s eyes, all she could see was her son’s; his deep emerald orbs that she could vividly remember widening at the mere thought of a new pen, toy and even a baby sister. Robert’s cute button nose and rosy cheeks were also strikingly similar, she wondered if the two cousins remembered each-other? Nora couldn’t help but wonder if George remembered _her._

“There’s ma wee son!” Alec cheerfully enters, heading over to the pair and taking a seat on the nearest barstool to were his sister was cleaning, pulling Robert in front a subtle embrace.

Nora raised an eyebrow after examining her brother’s face. Alec had three scars on his forehead. He only had one of those this morning.

“Where’s the bags Al?”

“Whit bags?”

“Jane asked ye tae get messages, where are they?”

The brunette clenches his jaw. “Dropped them aff at the hoose.”

“Don’t talk shite,” she glares, “that’ll work oan Edie an yer missus bit no me.”

“Wis it-“

“Nora.”

“I swear Alec, if yer-“

“Am no wae the Conks anymare, dae look that stupit?”

“Dae _ah?_ ‘Cause whit yer tellin’ me is no whit ‘av heard.”

There’s a tension that Nora is not afraid to air in a public setting, but she knew Alec was. Still, she’d paid to price of doing the around George and Rosie with Michael when he’d come back in the same state, so to soften the blow, she turns to her nephew. “Dae ye want tae go ring yer mammy fur me? Tell her we’ll be up the road soon.”

Robert glances between the two adults, closing over his notebook then scurries off into the back den.

“Whit’ve ye heard?”

“Wee Davey telt me you an McCavern wir square-goin doon the gallowgate.’”

“When?”

“So ye hiv been fightin’”

“That’s no whit ah asked.”

“Aye well,” she stumbles, knowing she was in the right, but Alec would persist, “that’s whit am tellin’ ye, so wrap it an go clean that fucking blood aff yer face fur the wean ye dirty bastard.”

He grabs the damp rag from her, dabbing at the cut above his lip. “It’s no whit ye ‘hink, he’s uptae something.”

“Aye, well it’s nane ay oor business so leave the git alane and keep yerself, tae yerself." she sighs, "ye've got a wee boy, think aboot that Alec, it's no jist you noo. Ma man didnae, an look wir ah am. Ye don't want that fur Jane."

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Do I like this? No, but I feel getting this out of the way allows for some streamlined stories and some other points of view. Might come back and add more but I wanted to get this out the way. But things don't kick off for Nora until the death of Bonnie Gold, because as of right now, the Shelby's mean nothing to her.

**Author's Note:**

> Don't worry, this is not the typical length of chapters, I'm going to try aim around 3,000 every chapter but George's birth seemed most appropriate due to it's significance in their relationship.
> 
> In the meantime, if you are looking for Nora one-shot's with her children, they are at amidst-wonderland on tumblr, just search the Nora Gray tag.


End file.
